


Childhood's End

by DixieDale



Category: Garrison's Gorillas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-26
Updated: 2018-06-26
Packaged: 2019-05-29 01:26:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15062033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DixieDale/pseuds/DixieDale
Summary: Innocence, humanity - such fragile things, so easily lost.  Wartime - Garrison, the guys, a young girl.





	Childhood's End

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place during the War Years, shortly after 'The Imposter'.

Their contact was a Herr Straum, widower, well-respected man of the town, owned and ran a long-established place of business. He had been reluctant to bring Garrison and the men into his home, but he HAD promised assistance and, after a frank discussion with the American, had led them to a back room. Oh, he was not reluctant about aiding them in their mission, but only for the safety of his young daughter, her innocence. He himself was away for the daytime hours, and while his daughter went to school for some hours of the day, still, she would be alone in the house with these strangers, these strange men, and certainly that was more than any father could feel at ease with.

Still, he accepted Garrison's assurances, and told himself that he indeed could trust the man to keep his daughter safe from harm. And if none of the guys particularly appreciated the stern lecture they got from Garrison about the girl, that they weren't to so much as wink at her, well, they could understand where her father was coming from. Yeah, it hurt a little that the Warden would think they'd hurt the kid, but they were used to people not exactly thinking the best of them, so they shrugged it off. Yeah, so she was a pretty thing, a girl on the verge of being a young woman. And that smile she'd given them, it had been real nice.

Garrison looked around the room: Actor, sophisticated, superior. Casino, brusque, rough around the edges. Chief, reserved, keeping his emotions well hidden. Cheeky little Goniff. He frowned, hesitated, and gave them one more stern warning. He'd been working with them for some time now; surely he could trust them in this. Surely.

Gerta Straum was an attractive girl, maybe fourteen, fifteen, shyly welcoming of these men who'd been brought into their home through that back entrance. Her father, Herr Straum, he was a good man; he wouldn't invite anyone here who wasn't also equally good. She loved her father, respected him, knew him to be a man of honor. He was an intelligent man, of course, a learned man, and she had always been careful to listen to him, learn from him.

Her Klaus had been a man of honor too, and a man of considerable intelligence, and although she grieved dreadfully, though privately, when the word had passed through the town that Private Klaus Meir had died fighting for the cause, still she could honor his memory, keep his memory strong in her heart. Of course, she could not do so openly; she and Klaus, although they loved each other dearly, had kept their love, even their knowing of each other kept quite secret, quite private. He said that was important, and she knew Klaus knew best. And although they had intended to marry one day, it would have only been possible once the war was over, once the monstrous enemy had been defeated. Once the Allies, the Americans and the British and all the others who dared stand against her beloved Fuhrer, had been driven into the sea and destroyed once and for all.

"You daughter, she knows?" Garrison asked, as they huddled in the small room in the back of the house.

Herr Straum shook his head emphatically, "no, and she must not. You must be careful; do not let her hear you speak in anything but German; do not speak of your plans where she might hear anything." He sighed, rubbed his hand over his head.

"You must understand. I must continue to play the role of a loyal German; that is all she has ever heard from me. That is what is preached at the schools, what the town officials preach at every occasion. There are those who listen, who watch, and any who disagree with what is happening, who let that be know, they disappear and their families with them. No, Gerta considers me to be the most loyal follower of Hitler there could be, and we MUST keep it that way. All depends on that."

Actor frowned, "and after the war? Surely someday the truth will come out," and the helpless frustration in the man's eyes was apparent to them all.

"I do not know; I cannot think that far ahead, I can only do what must be done now. For now, for your safety, for mine and her own, she must not know."

Garrison looked at each of his men; he and Actor spoke and understood German, there was no problem there. Of the others, well, Casino was understanding more and more, though not speaking it worth a damn. Chief, about the same, and Goniff, he was hopeless. No matter WHAT language Actor tried him on, it all came out with a strong English accent, one that just couldn't be disguised as anything other than it was. This wasn't going to make their job any easier. 

The illness came on fast; early afternoon the tall Italian had been fine, reviewing the maps, figuring out with the others the best entrances, the best exits. By early evening, he was stretched out on a pallet on the floor, sweating, breathing as if he'd run a long, long race, eyes fluttering, not opening even at the most urgent of their voices.

"Don't know, Warden. Just, started getting an odd look, got all sweaty, ended up just about passin out."

Goniff had been out rounding up the proper uniforms, Chief checking on a proper vehicle for the job, Garrison performing his assigned role as a visiting German big-shot with the local officials. Casino and Actor had been alone in the room, and the safecracker swore nothing out of the ordinary had happened, certainly nothing to bring on something like this.

"Maybe some illness he picked up before we left, that took awhile to set in?" Garrison asked aloud, not expecting an answer and not getting one. He went and got a pan of cool water, clean cloths from a concerned Gerta, and they took turns trying to keep Actor comfortable, since Herr Straum had regretfully told them the only doctor was not to be trusted.

Casino was left behind to watch over Actor; well, his part in this caper was still ahead and the others could handle the other little pieces of the puzzle for right now. Garrison headed back to do the pretty with the mayor and his confederate, the chief of police; Goniff and Chief to do a little 'shopping'. Garrison returned to find Goniff and Chief, more than a little agitated, Actor much the same, but no Casino.

"Wasn't here when we got back, Warden. No sign, just gone. Actor, he's still so out of it, he can't tell us anything."

Garrison went through the house, not finding anything out of order. Herr Straum had left right after breakfast for his job, wasn't due back til late afternoon, so there was no help there. A rattling of the front door knob had him pressed back against the wall, hand on his knife; he only relaxed when his green eyes met the startled azure blue of young Gerta. Her hand went to her throat, "ah, Herr Danner! You startled me!"

He forced a smile at the girl; well, from her reaction, that certainly had been the truth, and he felt rather ashamed of himself. He picked up the brown paper wrapped package she'd dropped, and handed it to her with a earnest smile. "My apologies, Gerta. I was thinking of something else, and you startled me too."

Her smile grew wide, "a lady perhaps, Herr Danner? Is she pretty, this lady you were think of?" and he smiled and admitted, "yes, quite pretty. Though not so pretty as yourself, maybe," and she blushed with pleasure at the compliment.

"And you, Gerta? You have a boyfriend, perhaps? Someone to appreciate such a lovely young lady?" and the look in her eyes shifted somewhat, giving just a glimpse of something, something not quite readable to Garrison.

"Oh, perhaps, Herr Danner. If so, you can be sure he is a man of honor, a man of courage. With my father as an example, how could it be otherwise?"

While that seemed a rather evasive answer, Craig Garrison was hardly really interested in the romantic affairs of a teenage girl; he'd only been being polite, playing the part he was expected to play. He would have perhaps been more interested if he'd seen the change in those blue eyes as she went past him, into her own room at the top of the stairs, seen the satisfaction in her face, the cold smile as she thought back to that conversation she'd overheard, between her father and that green-eyed man. But he didn't, and he was left to return to the room where his team was gathered. 

"Alright, I have to meet with his lordship the mayor again! The man simply will not stop talking; maybe next time I'll remember not to stress just how important my connections are! He's trying to make some big points; I think he has ambitions reaching a lot higher than mayor."

He looked around the room; no one was happy. Actor was still down for the count, worse maybe than before, in spite of the herb tea Gerta had been bringing him, the one that was reputed to work so well against general fevers and illnesses. Casino was still missing, and not a trace to be found, Herr Straum as bewildered and almost as worried as they were.

"Chief, you stay here, no one in or out. Goniff - wait til I'm gone, then head out and see if you can get the keys to that facility for tonight; we have to make our move or we lose the chance; they're moving the codebooks in the morning."

He left and the two were left, looking at each other, looking down at Actor. Goniff was blinking rapidly, a sure sign his mind was working overtime. Sometimes that was a good thing, sometimes not so much, depending on what part was involved - the smart part, the cunning part, or the totally 'what-the-shit??' part. Chief knew that all too well, and waited to see which came to the surface.

Finally, the little pickpocket wrinkled his nose, issued a disgusted hfff of a sound. "Chiefy, I know this sounds off, but . . ."

He licked his lips, looking at his team mate, ready for the rejection of what he was about to say. "Well, just watch yourself, you and Actor too. And, maybe you shouldn't let Gerta feed Actor any more of that tea."

The young Indian frowned, "Gerta? Goniff, what bee you got buzzing around in that so-called brain a yours? She's a kid." 

Goniff flushed, and shrugged that self-disparaging one shoulder shrug they knew so well. "Yeah, sure, still . . . Look, I know you're the one what gets the 'unches, Chiefy, but I knew someone once, a lot younger than Gerta even . . . Well, just do it, okay? And, don't turn your back on 'er either. Aint like I'm saying 'urt 'er or anything, just don't be thinking of 'er so much as a little kid," and with that, he left. Chief thought about all of that, thinking about the look in Goniff's eyes, like he was remembering things he'd just as soon not be remembering. 

He shook himself briskly, "hell, he's getting nuttier all the time! Sometimes what Casino calls him, 'dumb Limey', sometimes it fits."

That brought his mind back to their missing team mate, though, made him remember how Casino had just disappeared into nowhere, from this very room, it would seem. Somehow, that made him give just a little more thought to what their sometimes off-the-wall Englishman had said. Well, at least until the smiling girl tapped on the door, opened it and poked her pretty head in.

"I have brought you some food. Also, some soup for your friend. I think he has had enough of the tea, but the soup is very nourishing." He couldn't help smiling back; somehow, she reminded him of Christine, something in the tilt of her head, the way she smiled. He was still smiling when she bent to put the tray on the table; was still smiling when he caught a glimpse of the bare knife in her hand, aimed at his gut. 

Garrison walked into a furious Goniff trying to staunch the wound in Chief's side. "TOLD you to watch out for 'er; TOLD you, Chiefy! Wasn't talking just to 'ear myself, you know! Bloody 'ell!"

Garrison broke in, "what happened?"

"The girl, Warden. Came in with food . . ."

"Food and a bloody knife! And 'e aint the only one! Found Casino; couldn't get 'im up the steps without 'elp from one a you; got back from getting the keys, decided to take another look around. There's a little room back of the basement; 'e's in there, 'e's alive, pissy as 'ell, though. She asked 'im to 'elp 'er fetch from something down there, took a skillet upside 'is 'ead when 'is back was turned! Bloody 'ell!"

The little Englishman was as wound-up as they'd ever seen him. Herr Straum was in the doorway now, pale, having heard most of that.

"We must retrieve your man, get you and the others out of here. If Gerta has done this, she knows who you are. There will be others here, quickly."

They departed, wondering just what would happen to Herr Straum, to his daughter, realizing they might never know. Would her love for her father prevent her from betraying him? Perhaps they were lucky in that they never knew. Perhaps we are as well.

It was in the car, not the original car but the one they'd changed into two towns over, that Garrison heard more of the story. Actor was coming around, still not moving quickly, but now that the doctored tea was wearing off, able to think and respond. Chief had been very aware of letting his guard down, despite Goniff's warnings.

"Just, she was a girl, just a kid. Saw the knife, saw her eyes, but . . ." He looked up at Garrison, "coulda got my blade out, I just . . . " and Garrison nodded in understanding. Garrison might have been understanding, the others were, well, most of them.

Goniff wasn't, not yet. He was still pissed, and he let them all know it. Deep inside he knew it was more himself he was, well, not pissed at, more ashamed of. He could see himself killing Gerta, no hesitation, no doubts, as soon as he'd realized she intended to kill him, probably the others too. Well, he might have been the only one who could have acted, would have understood that being 'just a kid' didn't mean shit sometimes. Maybe what he was so pissed at, was that he COULD see that, COULD have taken the necessary action, knowing his team mates, the Warden couldn't have. Knowing they still possessed their humanity, when he just wasn't so sure he did anymore, not much of it anyway.

Suddenly he wanted desperately to be back in Brandonshire, back at The Cottage. Meghada, his 'Gaida, she knew where that remaining bit of his humanity lay; she could always find it, steady it, cause it to grow stronger again. He dreaded the day when it would have faded so much that she couldn't do that anymore. What would he do when that day came?

Later, in the Common Room, Garrison bemoaned, "she was hardly more than a child."

Major Richards offered a solemn, "she was not a child, Craig, not anymore. Sometimes I wonder how many children are really left in Germany, in France, in so many places. Sometimes I think we are missing a whole generation, being left with only adults and small warped embittered adults in children's bodies. That is perhaps the greatest tragedy, a tragedy we've never experienced before in many, many years, the loss of innocence, such early loss of childhood. How will it affect those who survive, having to go on without that innocence? Perhaps it might take years to recover what we have lost; perhaps we never truly will."

The two having that discussion, both men sharing if not the same nationality, still much in common in their backgrounds, they sat there in full agreement, nodding in their shared concern, their shared wisdom. They continued their conversation in quiet tones. 

They may have noticed when Goniff and Chief exchanged an inscrutable glance and got up together and left the room, maybe not; maybe not even when Casino, then Actor followed, leaving the two officers with so much in common together to nod wisely and bemoan the current nature of things. They certainly couldn't have read the minds of those men, Goniff thinking about all the 'innocence' the East End of London had offered him from his very earliest days, all it had offered the other children there - Chief, with his memories of the reservation, the 'schools' and other establishment set up for him and his kind, the 'guiding hand' of the missionaries and others - yes, certainly innocence had reigned supreme there. Casino, well, his memories were better, his family a loving, embracing one, at least for the most part - but innocence - not so much. And Actor, his eyes showed their own bitterness, their own memories; he might not share them, not now, maybe never, but no, he hadn't remembered so much innocence either.

It wasn't that any of them were discounting the basic truth of what Richards and Garrison were discussing, that the war was costing everyone so much, especially the children; it was just the irony of them discussing it as if it were a new thing, this stripping of the innocence from children well before their time; that, along with the irony of its being discussed, pontificated over by men who, apparently, HAD experienced their share of that innocence and assumed everyone had had the same. 

Goniff was the only one who said anything, back in the Dorm, as Casino pulled out a bottle of hidden whiskey and poured a good jolt into each of the glasses he pulled from under his cot, while each of them sat on their own cots. The smile on their pickpocket's face wasn't really a smile, more a tortured grimace filled with all the bitterness and resentment and anger he couldn't have expressed in that other room, things they'd never seen so clearly expressed in his face before even with them, a bitterness reflected in his strained and harsh voice now.

"Ai, mates - 'ere's to 'innocence' - whatever the bloody 'ell that is," and Actor noted with concern that slip from 'ruddy' to the 'bloody' the small man tried to avoid, as well as that the smaller man was shaking now, the tremors coming as if never to stop, his hands gripping that glass so tightly his knuckles showed dead white.

"Goniff, perhaps . . ." thinking to suggest their resident pickpocket leave via those loose bars, go to the Cottage, to Meghada. He stopped before he could get the words out, seeing that look of comprehension in those pale blue eyes, then the fast glance at Chief, Casino, then back to Actor, then the resolution forming, hard and fast. No, Goniff wouldn't leave them alone with their own pain to get relief from his own, not while there was no place for them to find similar warm arms to hold back the night, not this time. There was a hard shake of that flaxen-blond head, a firming of his lips, and a harsh, "let's 'ave another drink, eh, mates?" and they drank together in silence until it was time to put out the light.


End file.
